“﻿Your sincere joyous intelligent service to SRF and to God has been extremely pleasing to me. May you be born in the Cosmic Mother, and inspire all with your spiritual motherliness only — only to bring others to God by the example of your life. Blessings eternal.”

— Paramahansa Yogananda

“Before [Paramahansa Yogananda] left this earth plane, he had mentioned, ‘After my passing, only love can take my place.’ After his passing, embodied love has taken his place, in the person of Daya Mata….The devoted disciple faithfully carries on the Master’s mission, not just by saying what he said but by being what he was.”

— Swami Venkatesananda (a monk of the Divine Life Society)

“The joy of that meeting [with Sri Daya Mata] is still fresh in my heart. She radiates wonderful love: that is her message.”

— Sri K. Krishnan Nair, direct disciple of Mahatma Gandhi

“History is sprinkled with the relics of religious sects that flamed and flickered out — brief candles of faith that were lighted by a charismatic leader and died within a short time after he died….The Self-Realization Fellowship, too, seemed likely to sputter out after the death of Founder Paramahansa Yogananda in 1952, but instead it has thrived….Since 1955, the sect has been governed by Miss Faye Wright, known in the Fellowship as Daya Mata.”

— Time Magazine

“I found in Self-Realization Fellowship the highest spirituality, service, and love. Not only do their representatives preach these principles but they live according to them.”

— Remarks by the Shankarcharya of Puri, His HolinessJagadguru Sri Bharati Tirtha, following a visit withSri Daya Mata at SRF headquarters in 1958.

“Nowhere does [Paramahansa Yogananda’s] legacy shine with more radiance than in his saintly disciple Sri Daya Mata, whom he prepared to carry on in his footsteps after he would be gone….Those who, like myself, were privileged to have met Paramahansaji find reflected in Daya Mataji that same spirit of divine love and compassion that so impressed me on my first visit to the Self-Realization Center almost forty years ago.”

— Dr. Binay R. Sen, former Ambassador of India to theUnited States and Director General of the Food andAgriculture Organization of the United Nations.

“Sri Daya Mata personifies love and compassion and the other timeless values of Indian culture….Her speeches are not dry academic dissertations on abstract theological principles, but intensely personal hymns testifying to her ecstatic vision of the Creator.”

— Sri Nani A. Palkhivala, former Ambassador of Indiato the United States

“I have had the privilege of meeting several times with Sri Daya Mata….Anyone who has been in her presence cannot fail to be affected by the aura of spiritual peace and serenity that she radiates….The message of Sri Daya Mata is one of great importance and relevance in this age of doubt and skepticism….They are a proclamation, not only of the oneness of the human race, but also of the oneness of man with God.”

— C. V. Narasimhan, Under-Secretary-General, United Nations

“I interviewed [Sri Daya Mata] and was very much impressed with her for many reasons: her intelligence, her sincerity, her truthfulness — I always gauge people by their truthfulness — and her broadminded view of the religion field….The tip of a mountain for me has always produced its own glow, its own radiance. And, for me, the tip of Mt. Washington has always embodied that special glow in the person of Daya Mata.…May I convey my lasting respect, admiration, and love, and an acknowledgment that her mission is unique, even as she is uniquely able to fulfill it.”

— Dan Thrapp, former religion editor of the Los Angeles Times

“When I met the Reverend Mother Daya Mata for the first time, in 1958, I was astonished. How could a Westerner be just like one of the great saints of India? Then I understood the power of the Self-Realization teachings. Her God-realization didn’t come by accident. By her efforts at applying the Guru’s teachings, she had attuned herself to God, and so His wisdom flowed into her.”

— Swami Shyamananda Giri, a member of the Board of Directorsof SRF/YSS until his passing in 1971

“That same spirit (bhava) that I saw in your Master, I see in you.”

— Remarks made to Sri Daya Mata by Anandamoyi Ma,one of modern India’s greatest saints, during a visit to Anandamoyi Ma’s ashram in India.

“For me, as a member of a religious order, Daya Mata is a shining example of what a life committed to the service of God and neighbor ought to be....In her presence there are no Catholics, Protestants, or Hindus, but only children of the one Father, God. And each one of them she receives graciously and has a place for them in her heart. I, a Catholic nun, have experienced so much her kindness and her interest and encouragement. I always felt that she treated me as one of her own. For me she will always be an ideal of what my life as a religious ought to be….She radiates God.”

— A Catholic Sister of Charity

“[Sri Daya Mata] was soft-spoken and natural, a person obviously at peace with herself. Elvis took to her immediately. Thus began an ongoing dialogue between Elvis and Sri Daya Mata that profoundly influenced his life….He had great respect for this woman.”

— Priscilla Presley

“What is the essence of an angel? It’s somebody who’s angelic, somebody who has that purity within themselves. Just the presence within a person like Daya Mata is what I would call the angelic quality.”

— Musician George Harrison

“In 1967, Sanghamata Dayamataji visited India — an event which I was looking for….In my exposure to her presence I saw in her a Universal Mother — an embodiment of divine energy, motherly love and compassion….Dayamataji, with her aura, benevolence and compassion commanded my reverence to her.”